Throughout my life I have always been a supporter of unions, although I
have never been the member of a union that really looked out for its
rank-and-file. As a kid growing up in Los Angeles, I was a member of
the projectionists union, Local 150 of the IATSE, which had the
distinction of turning down a cost of living increase. When I drove cab
in New York, our union was headed by an electrician who had never
driven a cab. And now as a teacher, I am a member of UTLA, which is
headed by staff and administration that will never see the inside of a
classroom again and whose president A.J. Duffy controls access to the
UTLA newspaper, so that rank-and-file are unable to express their ideas.
After being subjected to a barrage of articles in the media trying to
lay off failed public schools on teachers, NPR decided to have a debate
on the following topic:
Are Teachers' Unions to Blame for Failing
Schools?The problem I have with this topic stems from the false dichotomy that
assumes teachers unions and public school districts are adversarial. It
is my contention that if they were, most of the problems we now face in
public education
would not exist. Whether it is LAUSD and other big
city public school districts or UTLA and other big city teachers union,
both are run by people who got out of the classroom as quickly as
possible -- one sometimes wonders if they ever got into teaching in the
first place to teach or as a mere stepping stone to the high salaries
and perks reserved for those who go into administration?
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-3311-LA-Public-Education-Examiner~y2010m3d2-UTLA-screwed-the-teachers-of-LAUSD-and-the-students
UTLA screwed the teachers of LAUSD and the students